The New Jew in Film: Exploring Jewishness and Judaism in Contemporary Cinema

Jewish film characters have existed almost as long as the medium itself. But around 1990, films about Jews and their representation in cinema proliferated and took on new forms, marking a significant departure from the past. With a new generation of Jewish filmmakers, writers, actresses and actors at work, contemporary cinemas in Hollywood and the rest of the world have been depicting a multiplicity of new Jews, including tough Jews, brutish Jews, gay and lesbian Jews, Jewish cowboys, skinheads and superheroes, and Jews in space. The New Jew in Film is grounded in the study of over 300 films in Hollywood and beyond, including productions from Argentina, Australia, Canada, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Mexico, Russia, Spain, Sweden and the United Kingdom, as well as the United States and Israel. It explores these newand changing depictions of Jews, Jewishness and Judaism, providing a wider, more representative picture of the subject than has hitherto been attempted. This is a compelling, surprising and provocative book, whose chapters explore masculinity, femininity, sexuality, passivity, agency, religion, as well as new territory, including foodand bathrooms. Nathan Abrams’s concern is to reveal how the representation of the Jew is used to convey confidence or anxieties about Jewish identity and history, as well as how it engages with questions of racial, sexual and gender politics. Inso doing, he also provides a welcome overview of important Jewish films produced globally over the last twenty years.